My Big Opinions…

When you hear the words “Baby Signs” your first thought may be about former yuppies going overboard with the latest craze (baby aerobics anyone?). Your second one may be why a pre-verbal toddler has to speak in full sentences, or use verbs. But in this case, signing with your baby or toddler isn’t as crazy as it first sounds.

As a mother myself, I highly recommend using baby signs to bridge that time period between a year and two and a half or so, when frustrations and emotions are running high, and the poor little tykes can’t talk about anything. It stops a lot of screaming, and pointing at the fridge or cupboard, and that’s why we started using them around a year. It was a joy to have those first conversations with my child after so long a period of one-way communication. Toddlers can even bring up topics on their own. Some parents start use signs much earlier (6-9 months) with no problems that I can see.

We taught basic signs, some made up on our own, but most American Sign Language (ASL) signs: food, drinks, animals, baby. By the time my toddler was almost two, she knew almost 200 signs! And we were not trying for a record or anything ridiculous like that.

Arguments For Using Signing:
They will be able to share anything they see, hear, think about with you!  We were sitting at the table eating, my toddler and I, when she signed, “Daddy, car, work.” She brought up a topic for the first time on her own, about a person she loved who was not there. And then I answered, using words and signing together.

You can communicate with other toddlers as well, in a semi-universal language. This might depend on whether you can understand the other child’s versions of the signs, of course (more on this in How to Learn below). You can also talk to and sometimes correct your child at a distance. (”No, shoes, no, shoes” – meaning put the kids shoes down at the park.)

My kid was able to ask for milk or juice at the table with no frustration, we then echoed her sign, and finally answered her with what she could have to drink with words and signs. She could talk about the baby she saw at the grocery store, the animals found on all the baby paraphernalia, as well as telling me “eat” or “drink.”

A Window Into Their Mind:
Kids first lump things into large categories, then later understand the differences between things. My husband, who’s a game designer, has told me that your brain rewards the finding of patterns in life by a release of endorphin. Video game theory is based on showing players patterns. I see this with baby’s first communication, too: they find patterns in their world, and then notice more detail in time. Fascinating! At first all animals were included under the dog sign, then birds were separated out, then other animals were pulled from the “dog” catch-all sign. First all kids were signed “girl”, the sign meaning “kids” to her, then later “boy” was separated out.

How It Helps Language Formation:
According to research that I read in the baby signing books, when kids cannot yet talk, it’s because they are missing the brain connections, not necessarily anything to do with their mouths. These connections naturally develop over time. Signing with your child helps develop these connections for signing and for speech.

How to Use Baby Signs:
When you sign with your child, say the word and sign at the same time, often several times. When your child signs back, talk for them to show you understand, then answer them in words and signs. If you just sign alone with them, it won’t help language formation. Keep phrases simple, with space between the words. “No juice, no juice, all gone, milk,” or “dog, dog, see (point to eye), there, there (pointing).”

How to Learn:
You could make up your own, and probably will, as you and your toddler interact. There are several different books at the library by different authors. Some of the pictures are hard to understand, because they are a static version of a moving sign, or hand-drawn small cartoons of children’s hands. I think it makes sense to use the ASL ones, simply because they can be more recognizable among different mothers, caregivers, and daycare workers. I was watching a little boy, a bit over two years in age, who spoke not at all. His mother showed me a few of their personal signs before I watched him, but over the course of the next three or four hours I saw and recognized about twenty ASL signs that his mother and I had not talked about.

By far the best source for learning baby signs is a wonderful television show called “Signing Time.” It’s on public television for free (check your local listings), on YouTube, some public libraries, as well as for sale on their website. It looks like its made by two related families. The main characters are two kids named Alex and Leah, and the signs and songs are done by Leah’s mom, Rachel, who has her fingers taped with colored tape to make it easy to see her fingers. The show is full of fun, non-annoying kids’ music (a rarity these days), fun cartoons, some green screen work with the kids in front of cartoon backgrounds, and many examples of kids doing the signs.

Seeing many young children doing the signs is important for parents, because the signs done by children will be different from the official version. Sometimes they will merely be an abstract wave close to the place that they should be, or touching on a body part in the right place, but not using the fingers exactly right. This is not important as long as the parents understand (eventually) what the child means. It might be a guessing game at first. For instance, “water” is supposed to be the finger-shaped W letter touching a chin, just to the side of the mouth. My kid’s version was made by touching that spot with one finger. “More” is supposed to be made by closing each hand like its about to be a puppet talking, and then touching the two hands’ fingertips together in a tapping motion. My daughter’s version of more was touching one open palm with her finger. (Watch an online video sample- YouTube: rainbow colors, butterfly, zoo trip)

What’s funny is that in the new season Leah and Alex are so much bigger! The first shows they are really young – 2-4 maybe. Now, in the third season, they’re about 8-9 years old. I guess kids grow up!

I found a free online tutorial.

Be Prepared for Criticism:
I received some criticism from my mom, like “When are you going to teach that kid to talk?” The grandparents were unsure about it, but generally positive. Strangers were mostly open-minded enough to ask about it. I was teaching language, every day. Why subject yourself to screaming and howling in the meantime? Some children, especially boys, don’t talk until two and a half or three years old!! That’s a long time with no communication – as long as two years after the one year mark! So much frustration that can be avoided by using signing.

When to Stop, If Ever:
Different kids learn speech at very different rates – I’ve known a little boy who could talk and sign at 16 months, and some who could barely say anything at two and a half years. My own brother, an extremely smart person, barely talked until almost three years old. Learning rates vary greatly. My daughter could say about 15 words around 20 months (a bit over 1.5 years for you people who don’t count ages in months). She had learned one word every few weeks (which then disappeared), then one per week, then several per day when we were on a trip. (Boy, were we amazed! New environment…) Then suddenly the flood gates opened around 22 months: in a matter of weeks she could suddenly say a ton. Our signing together almost stopped right then in just a matter of weeks, because we could talk together. And after that she still enjoyed watching the television show “Signing Time,” signing and dancing with the music, and this time learned the sign again, but with greater accuracy. We do them for fun now. And it would be great to be able to talk with anyone hearing impaired. But baby signs were still useful when she was tired at the end of the day, or forgot a word. It’s tiring, learning a new language!

So give it a try with your baby or toddler, or learn a few signs so you can communicate with the youngsters you meet. It’s a window into their mind, a way to open up two way conversations, to understand how they see the world (maybe in grouped patterns at first), and for them to express their thoughts and needs without having to point and scream.

Here’s a wonderful video on YouTube showing a baby signing.